quaint little churches

i've suddenly started noticing quaint little country churches in sleepy little towns everywhere i go (and i go through quite a lot of sleepy little towns these days). most danish churches have a dutch renaissance architecture to them, but in recent days i've been noticing ones that don't.

despite not at all being religious, i do love churches as buildings. the thoughtfulness that has gone into their design - whether it's simple or extravagant - can always be admired. it's an architecture that somehow does often capture some holiness or at the very least a reverent hush.

i only snapped these as i went by, hopping out of the car on a windy, cold day to quickly capture them and then get back on my way, but i do love to go inside. especially if there's no one there. the quiet and the smell of warm wax are soothing. you can always find a moment of respite in the quiet, calm, holiness of a church space. and if there's anywhere that god (or odin or thor or whatever name you like to use) might be listening, it's surely in one of this little country churches.

blog swag rocks

pretty little creatively-wrapped (brown paper bags, stitched around the edges - how clever is that!) packages of bloggy swag that i won on lizzie's blog. there's really nothing more happy-making than a package in the mail. i've thus far restrained from opening, as i'm trying to wait 'til christmas. but i'm not sure i'll manage to hold out.

jody pearl, who does a lot of clever re-designing of clothing, hosted an op shop swap and i participated. she was my partner and i totally lucked out!  my package came wrapped in this great crochet-like net shopping bag.

inside was a book - have a little faith by mitch albom, which causes a mary chapin carpenter song to go through my mind every time i walk past it.

best of all was the most gorgeous, bright, felt-backed scarf that was exactly what i needed in these dark winter days. the little koala (which sabin snatched up) had on a little backpack containing lovely vintage buttons that i'll be using on some or other project in the near future. there was also a little beaded snowman, but sabin snatched him up as well.

a big thank you to both jody and lizzie!

reflections on november

i know we're 4 days into december, but i've been behind now for about two weeks, so why should it change now? looking back on november, i don't remember three days with sunshine, so i'm a little surprised to find them here among my november daily photos. tho' two of those days, it's quite obscured by fog. other than that, it appears we horsed around quite a lot and still enjoyed our baby bunnies, tho' they're growing up too fast!

it's funny, these pictures show a lot, but they also leave a lot out. they leave out that i've been teaching english and getting more involved in my local area and working on my book. i've been planning a new business (or a new and improved version of an old one). i've made dinner regularly and done laundry and vacuumed and watched good and bad television and listened to good radio. i've felt under the weather and i've despaired of the grey days. i hibernated a little bit. i fed the animals and talked to them quite a lot. and i made stuff. and in it all, i guess i survived another grey, long november in denmark.

happy weekend

hibernating

the darkness is relentless these days. i seem to have gone into a kind of hibernation. hunkering down. waiting for a winter that doesn't seem to come. i even saw buds on some dandelions today. kind of a hopeful sign, but also kind of not. dandelions on the last day of november? isn't that just wrong?

i'll be back soon. i've got blog swag to share.

get out there and meet someone new

after my recent paradigm shift, i've been thinking about ways to be more active in my local surroundings. because previously, when i haven't found the human interaction i felt i needed in my everyday life, i turned to the blogosphere for such things. (easy now, i'm not abandoning that!) but husband has long teased me that i should find creative people in my area and hang out with them.

late last week, i stumbled onto the brooklyn brainery website and through it, found the society for the advancement of social studies and i longed for there to be such organizations in my area - somewhere to hang out with interesting people, to learn something esoteric, to teach about something i love (like blogging? or how to go about a 365 photo project?). and on facebook, i lamented that if there were to be such a thing in my area, i'd have to start it.

after more than a decade of closing myself off in order not to feel that feeling of rejection from the at times cold culture around me, i screwed up my courage and went to the library. i go to the library all the time, so it's not that bit that required courage. i knew that one of the women who works there is involved in the local "culture house," and i decided that i'd talk to her and share my ideas with her and ask how i could get involved. just out of the blue. like that. opening myself to rejection and everything.

and guess what? she was totally cool about it! she gave me her card and invited me to their january meeting where they will elect a new board and discuss the coming year. she said there are also possibilities for such activities through the library and not only through the local culture house (they managed to get their hands on the quaint old city hall building in our little town). and so last night, i sent her a mail with some ideas. and i'll talk to her some more on thursday. and i'm feeling pretty excited about it.

sometimes you just have to dare to get out there and meet someone new.

evangelists on my doorstep

two kindly-looking ladies with a bible and a pamphlet in their hands just knocked at my door. they came to sell me a future - one that is apparently laid out for me in the bible. and here i was, thinking it was a historical document, not a crystal ball. i didn't really let them stick around to fill me in (tho' i wouldn't have  minded knowing the next date of the rapture, since i never did figure out what to wear to the last two).

call me crazy, but i just find belief to be a very personal thing and not really something i want to share with strangers who knock on my door out of the blue. it seems to me that a whole lot of objectionable stuff is going on in the world in the name of religion and the bible and gods of all ilks.

but i do believe that god or a higher force or whatever you'd like to call it, is found all around us, in glorious skies and the sun breaking through the clouds and beautiful silhouettes of trees against a foggy horizon. it's there that i find god.

that's what i should have told them.

instead, i told them i was american and had had enough religion to last a lifetime...